Following on from my recent post about the iPhone 4 Bumper case and an excellent follow-up comment on it from Jonathan Issacs I thought I’d outline a few issues I’ve found with charging my iPhone 4.

First, to address Jonathan’s question, which was:

Great post Elaine, I assume that when using a bumper this has to be taken off for the phone to use the dock?

However I’m sure I read somewhere that this wasn’t the case (no pun intended), could you shed some light on the situation?

I made the decision not to buy the new dock, which is especially designed for iPhone 4, long before I sat in the store on launch day facing the temptation head-on! I was still smarting from my recent purchase of the iPad dock and my disappointment with it, full details of why I was disappointed are in MacBites Episode 44 but a few of my issues with it are:

1. It won’t charge the iPad without removing the case
2. It isn’t sturdy enough to hold the iPad and allow typing on the screen without the iPad rocking dangerously
3. It only holds the iPad in portrait mode, not the best for watching video

All of which didn’t stop me admiring the aesthetics of the new dock on launch day, but I refrained. The reason I refrained was that the new dock will not charge the iPhone without removing the Bumper case. This would not be a big issue but for how awkward it is to remove the Bumper case, which is extremely close fitting.

I had high hopes of repurposing the iPad dock for use with the iPhone 4 but it doesn’t fit the iPhone 4 either with or without the Bumper *foiled again*.

But no worries I guess there’s always the charging cable, right?

Well it turns out not all charging cables are made equal and when your iPhone 4 is wearing a Bumper this makes a difference. Over the years the design of these cables has varied greatly and they don’t all work with the new Bumper clad iPhone 4.

From the left these are, iPhone 4, iPod 60gb Video, generic replacement cable

The cable that ships with the iPhone 4 works perfectly even when it’s in the Bumper case. However, the 60gb video iPod cable doesn’t work and neither does the generic replacement on the right.

The dock connector with the Bumper case on

The reason is the width of the plastic casing, as shown in the image of the cables above and the silicon inside the Bumper covering the connector, shown in the previous image.

The head of the cable has become progressively thinner over the years and while this is elegant in design it’s not without issues.

Obviously my immediate concern is that a wider casing means it won’t charge my iPhone without removing the case.

A corollary issue is that the reason I had bought a generic replacement rather than a replacement cable manufactured by Apple was that with each interaction of the Apple cable it has become more fragile and less fit for purpose.

I have had an Apple cable split at the connector end on my iPod Shuffle, Apple acknowledged the issue and replaced it. Sadly this wasn’t a one off and there are at least three Apple cables in the house right now that I don’t deem safe to use, having split in general use.

Here’s just one of them!

So it looks like a catch 22 for me right now, I’m happy with the Bumper case but using it means I can’t use the dock or anything other than a new style Apple cable for charging and synching, the build quality and/or design of which is, in my opinion, flawed for anything other than extremely light use.

After the usual organized chaos of the pre-order system (it melted), the fight with the car park (got locked in this time not locked out) and the horrendous queue (see pictures below) I have a shiny new iPhone 4.

This is my second iPhone the first being the 3G version in 2008, I was forced to miss the 3GS due to the 18 month contract I was locked into with O2. This time however I had outwitted them by transferring to the Simplicity for iPhone contract in January this year paying £20 a month for more voice minutes and texts with the other services staying the same.

Since the white iphone 4 wasn’t available on launch day my only decision was between the 16gb and 32gb versions and since this would be my first iPhone capable of recording video I considered the decision pretty much made for me … a 32gb it would be.

So I was all sorted, or was I? The only thing I hadn’t decided on was a case. When Apple announced the iPhone 4 they also announced a semi-case called a Bumper. As a case was a bit lacking as it had neither a back or a front, it was in essence a strip of what looked like elastic which wrapped around the metal edge of the new device.

I’ll admit I wasn’t particularly impressed with it as a case and even less impressed with the price of $29 which using Apple’s exchange rate translated to £25. Hence, the only options available at launch were a £25 elastic band or a naked iPhone. I decided to reserve judgement on the Bumper until I’d seen it, which proved to be a wise move.

The night before launch a story started circulating regarding the cellular signal gradually diminishing when the iPhone 4 was held in a certain way. More information followed to the effect that it was touching the antenna system especially in the lower left corner of the phone that was causing the problem. If true then adding a Bumper to the device should mitigate the issue. The queue was alive with talk of this potential problem and there was much debate as to whether the Bumper would prevent it.

The staff brought phones out of the store to demo them to those waiting in the five various queues they had organized and when I asked if we could see the Bumpers in action he promptly returned to the store and brought one out which he passed around the queue. It was helpful to be able to see it and even better to be able to test it prior to making a decision regarding it’s purchase.

I decided in the end that it didn’t detract too much from the new sleek design and in fact having tried it I could see that with a Bumper I might not need any other case. The rim of the Bumper lifts the phone off any surface it is laid on so there’s less chance of scratching it. It also made the iPhone feel very secure when I was holding it, much more so than the case on my 3G.

Obviously with chatter reaching monumental proportions over the signal issue I tried replicating the symptoms on my iPhone 4 but with or without the Bumper I could not get the signal to degrade irrespective of how I held the device but plenty of others are reporting that they can so your mileage may vary.

Since my purchase many people have commented that they are seriously considering purchasing a Bumper to mitigate any problem with signal loss arising from touching the antenna. So for those considering the purchase here are a few images which show various comparisons between an iPhone 4 with a Bumper and one without.

Comparison of the front

Comparison of the back

There’s a cutout for the mute button and metal buttons for the volume controls

Cutout for headphone jack, secondary microphone and a metal button for the power switch

Yes it shows finger prints on the plastic strips

Contrary to my initial skepticism the Bumper isn’t just an elastic band it has more shape than that, nor is it made solely from rubber/silicon. There are shiny plastic strips on each edge which keep the shape of the Bumper.

Showing the cutout and buttons

Cutout for the iPhone charging/synching connector

Interior view of the cutout for the mute switch and volume controls

Interior view of the headphone jack cutout and the power switch

So that’s the iPhone 4 Bumper, I’d love to hear what you think and if you’ve any questions just add a comment!

Since the announcement of the iPad I’ve been amazed by the strength of feeling demonstrated by both sides of what has become the great Flash debate of 2010.

The iPhone has never supported Flash and while mention was made of that fact when v.1 was released it’s continued omission has not engendered any great depth of feeling. Since the iPad runs on essential the same operating system I didn’t expect Flash to be supported and therefore wasn’t surprised when it wasn’t.

What has happened since has astounded me: the vitriolic claims and counterclaims have flowed thick and fast.

Adobe have voiced their willingness to work together with Apple to resolve any concerns Apple may have. While Apple initially said nothing Steve Jobs this week had plenty to say on the subject at least to his own employees. According to Wired and Macrumors (US spelling is correct!) Apple’s CEO said “They are lazy. They have all this potential to do interesting things but they just refuse to do it. They don’t do anything with the approaches that Apple is taking, like Carbon. Apple does not support Flash because it is so buggy. Whenever a Mac crashes more often than not it is because of Flash. No one will be using Flash. The world is moving to HTML5.”

The world may be moving to HTML 5 but Jobs is overlooking the fact that the majority of the browsing world isn’t there yet and as the longevity of Internet Explorer 6 demonstrates old technology takes some considerable time to die out completely.

As an active member of the Adobe Community Programme I have access to the very best Flash developers, programmers and users. Obviously their stance is that Apple are missing a fantastic opportunity to offer a full browsing experience on their newest product by continuing to shun Flash.

Many Apple users are of the opposite opinion even going so far as disabling Flash in their more than capable Mac desktop computers and laptops. To the uninitiated that may seem tantamount to removing the nose to spite the face but to a large percentage of Mac users it makes perfect sense.

Why?

Well while Flash runs admirably on the Windows platform it does so because Microsoft have granted Adobe, the manufacturer of Flash, access to the Windows graphic APIs. Apple have steadfastly refused to do so for their OS X platform. So while the Flash development platform and the Flash Player is available for OS X is does not have access to the Apple OS X graphic APIs and as such is unable to benefit from the performance enhances access to them would provide. The workarounds Adobe have employed to mitigate the effects of having no API access have meant that Flash does not run as well on OS X as it does on Windows.

Hence, Flash is regarded by many OS X users as a resource hog and they choose to deploy third party applications whose sole function is to stop Flash running in their browser. The most popular of these Flash blockers is ClickToFlash available at no cost from http://rentzsch.github.com/clicktoflash/

No-one can deny that much of the Flash content that is presented to users in a browser falls into the category of “annoying adverts” but Adobe would no doubt prefer that their tools are not blamed for the output of web designers with predilections for creating such content. Flash gets such a bad press for the “annoying adverts” that it’s easy to overlook the innovations that it was responsible for and the inventiveness the Flash developers and community continue to demonstration.

Much has been made in the pro-Apple camp of the fact that HTML 5 is an open standard whereas Adobe and it’s Flash platform is a commercial entity. However, this stance conveniently ignores the roots of the Mac community exemplified in the pivotal 1984 advert for Macintosh. The ideology of Apple as the David against the Goliath of IMB is clear from that advert and the seeming reversal of roles is clearly advanced by this erudite post from Adobe Community Manager Rachel Luxemburg.

So a week on instead of enjoying the buildup to the release of the iPad we are bombarded with requests to petition Apple to change it’s stance and subjected to Steve Jobs scornful opinion of Adobe. At the same time we’re witnessing users blocking Flash on one class of device while another equally vocal group of users are demanding it’s deployment on another platform.

As a Mac user for the last four years I personally have never disabled Flash. I have never found it to be so annoyingly slow, unstable or capricious to warrant such treatment but I personally know many who have. Since Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro, an online conferencing system I use on a very regular basis, requires Flash I won’t be doing without it anytime soon either.

Sadly the omission of Flash from the iPad means I won’t be lounging somewhere comfortable while presenting or participating via Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro when the iPad is released. However, I’m not too concerned about it as I’ve had a Flash-less iPhone for over 18 months now and can’t say life without it has been unbearable.

So what’s your take on it?

So the magic day has arrived … I’m out of contract on my iPhone 3G *deep joy*

Time to change to a better value tariff so off I headed to O2 in Bolton. I knew what I wanted was a tariff called Simplicity 20 for iPhone … if only acquiring it had been simple. Sadly, it was a complete disaster, for the full horror of the day take a listen to MacBites episode 40.

The store staff had clearly had no training in what was available to cater for the specific needs of iPhone customers. A glaring omission given that all the customers who purchased an iPhone 3G on the day of release are out of contract this month. The staff were all most helpful and cordial but this didn’t translate into a smooth transaction when they were unaware of the difference between a Simplicity tariff and a Simplicity for iPhone tariff.

For the record this is the difference:

Simplicity (During January promotion) – £20

• 700 Free voice minutes (100 minutes more than usual)
• 700 Free text messages (100 texts more than usual)
• 1 free bolt-on (they recommend unlimited internet)
• No visual voice mail
• No free wifi

Simplicity (After January promotion ends) – £20

• 600 Free voice minutes
• 600 Free text messages
• 1 free bolt-on (they recommend unlimited internet)
• No visual voice mail
• No free wifi

Simplicity 20 for iPhone – £20

• 600 Free voice minutes
• 1200 Free text messages
• 2 free bolt-ons (they recommend unlimited internet and unlimited wifi)
• Includes visual voice mail

The Best Way to proceed?

From my experiences I’d by-pass the stores, they don’t seem to have a clue what is the best option for iPhone customers coming out of contract, and call O2 directly. If given a choice, which you should be if ringing via your iPhone, select the option to speak to the cancellations department. The option actually connects you to a department called Retentions who seem to be the only people at O2 who have any knowledge of the existence of the iPhone version of the Simplicity tariff.

Tell the Retentions department you want to switch to Simplicity 20 for iPhone with 600 free minutes, 1200 free texts, 2 bolt-ons and visual voice mail. If they deny all knowledge of its existence ask to speak to a supervisor and/or show them this screen capture of my O2 account … it really exists!!

You might have to wait 24 hours for everything to be activated and you might have to manually reconfigure your settings. One of the side effects of changing tariffs was that the phone reset itself and failed to connect to the 3G network. This was easily rectified by entering the following settings into the General > Network > Cellular Data Network of the phone:

The only other gotcha I encountered was having to set Visual Voice Mail up again from scratch but this shouldn’t be necessary if O2 transfer you to the correct tariff in the first place. Being without my visual voice mail made me realize that it was a feature of the iPhone that I had greatly under-appreciated … a mistake I won’t make again

Good luck with your tariff transfers and I’d love to hear how you get on so be sure to leave me a comment below!

Within days of getting my iPhone 3G in the summer of 2008 I’d found a real time saving feature on the keyboard for entering URL extensions and blogged about it too at Quick URL Entry on an iPhone.

Well after the v.3 update not only is the feature still there but the range of extensions has been expanded.

Ireland will forever thank you

Nice attention to detail there Apple!

Version 2

Version 3

I love the .com button on the iPhone keyboard but often wished it was configurable – what I hadn’t discovered is that it already is!!

Clicking once on the .com does indeed add .com to the current address but holding your finger or thumb on the .com button produces a fly out menu containing extra options.

The precise options vary country by country and a full list is available from iPhone Central at Macworld.

The options shown here are those available in the UK.

How cool is that?

So how was iPhone launch day for you? I spent all day *and I do mean all day* enjoying myself in the Apple Store purchasing an iPhone … brace yourself for a long and funny story …

Mike and I spent the entire week tracking every Apple related site we could find to see if Apple would be selling the iPhone on Friday’s launch day and found nothing. The Apple Store couldn’t or wouldn’t confirm whether they would be selling it or not and referred all enquiries to the web site which was finally updated at 08:02 on Friday morning … you’ll see why that was no use later LOLOL

So we had a decision to make – stand outside the Apple Store on the off chance they would be selling them or queue at O2 and hope there were enough 16gb phones to go round. The later was very unlikely as the average available for sale per O2 store was between 3 and 6 … the only problem with that was the queue of 60 people outside fighting over them!!

So we headed off to the Trafford Centre at 06:30 more in hope than expectation … actually more in hope that expectation that we would even be able to get in the place as the car parks are locked behind impenetrable barriers until 09:30 by order of Trafford Council. As expected when we got there there was no way in to the car parks at all so we started casing the joint to find a way in. On our second circuit we found a car park with a broken barrier which meant we could sneak in. We managed to navigate from car park to car park until we got to the escalators next to Selfridges – absolutely perfect!!

The next issue was getting inside the place as it was locked tight. We knew others must already be queuing *following their antics on Twitter – very useful* so we waited until I spotted an unsuspecting Apple employee and we hot footed it after him up the escalator and very nonchalantly followed him inside after he used his staff card to get the door open )

The Trafford Centre is unusual in that it has two O2 store, two Carphone Warehouse stores and an Apple Store … in theory we couldn’t fail could we?

Once there we had the final decision to make – Apple and risk them not selling it or O2 and risk a sell out. We really shouldn’t have worried – Apple were set up perfectly, only 6 in the queue in front of us, more iPhone’s than even they could sell in a day and even better the rarer than hen’s teeth white 16gb model in stock. So it was tea, coffee, hot chocolate, bottles of iced water and hand made American cookies all round (all free courtesy of Apple – thanks guys) while we waited for the opening at 08:02 … which was why the web site update was lost on us!!

So we’re through the door at 08:02 and sat starting the purchase/contract creation process at 08:03 … oh dear, oh dear, oh dear that’s when it all ground to a halt. FIrst issue was that the O2 account creation process only worked on IE on Windows so it was VM Fusion all round while we cranked up IE amongst myriad warnings about virus protection and ad blocking requirements much to the bewilderment of hardened Apple users wondering what the hell was going on

The sign-up process was 9 sequential steps, the only respite being once you had passed the credit check at step 4 should the system crash you didn’t have to go back to step 1 but could resume at step 4. All of which was academic as it took until 11:00 for anyone in the store to actually reach the heady heights of passing the credit check stage!!

Of course passing step 4 didn’t mean a clear run to completion the system crashed time and time again, Windows gave up several times and more drinks and cookies were passed around as the phone lines to O2 HQ crashed and burnt.

The O2 store had only received 3 16gb iPhones and couldn’t activate any of them but in the end sold them to up-graders who could activate at home later. Meanwhile we were following the goings-on elsewhere via Twitter, MacRumors and a few other sites. It was the same story everywhere with O2 claiming they couldn’t have anticipated the demand … mmm that wasn’t washing as the system had crashed on Monday under the weight of pre-orders coming in at 13,000 per second. We were soon reading that in the O2 store in Milton Keynes the police had to be called in to rescue staff coming under fire from an angry mob who had queued for hours and were being asked to leave without their prized phones.

The flagship Apple Store in Regent Street London was forced to close at 15:00 as it just couldn’t cope with the numbers of folks turning up from out of stock O2 stores all over London. It was against stories like these coming in that we pressed on hoping and praying the O2 servers would have an epiphany and we’d manage to complete 2 purchases.

No kidding we all tried non-stop from entering the store at 08:02 and not a single person managed to complete the process until 13:20 when the first 4 of us (my relieved self included) signed off the process to rapturous applause form those in the queue, the Apple staff, the O2 staff on hand to help out and even shoppers outside in the Mall with no clue what was happening … unadulterated joy is obviously catching LOLOL

So finally just after 13:45 we left the store clutching 2 16gb white iPhones beaming from ear to ear.

The Apple Store staff had been fantastic as had the poor guys from O2 sent in to help with the contract related stuff. It was a good humoured “Dunkirk spirit” wait and I’d do it again in a heartbeat, it was sad to read of the problems other people had elsewhere like Milton Keynes but I guess a few hotheads who don’t know how to behave spoilt it for those who were prepared to wait. We figured we’d waited 19 months since the announcement of the iPhone and a few more hours wasn’t going to kill us *it nearly did but not quite*

Of course that wasn’t the end of our day … we then had to head to Vodafone to get a PAC number and cancel our existing service. We’ve both being out of contract for years and as Vodafone CANNOT give us an iPhone there wasn’t really much for them to say … but we’ve both been trying to get said PAC number for over a week and they are refusing point blank to give us one or let us terminate our service. The phone line people tell us to go in a store and the store people say they can’t do it and we need to write a letter to head office. Other people in the queue with Vodafone said the same thing and one poor guy even had 3 calls from Vodafone enforcement henchmen telling him the iPhone was cr*p and he should get a Nokia … each call lasted 30 minutes before he could get a word in. Mike has had three calls from Vodafone since Friday too – the why are you leaving, we’ll give you more free minutes, we’ll give you a gold bar if you stay with us type of blackmail!!

We finally managed to get someone in Customer Service *if anything was ever as misnamed* to start the termination on Friday afternoon so at the moment we’re both on temporary numbers for at least 2 weeks … and maybe more with Vodafone playing up.

It also took us an age to finish our celebratory meal, as every waiter in the Chinese restaurant insisted on coming over and admiring our phones, and an hour to get out of the Trafford Centre as people just shopping there wanted to see them too … I’d never seen anything like it!!

So an interesting day all round

Since we’d both made successful calls from the Apple Store as soon as we’d got the plastic off the phone we were unaware until much laster that other people were having huge problems getting the sim activated even days later. I hope it all fixes itself very soon for those affected.

Finally, there’s one thing you can say about us hardy Brits … we certainly know how to queue )

So the great day is almost upon us and the most important question (well it is if you leave out which store to go to … but that’s a whole different post) is a black backed iPhone or a white one?

Decisions, decisions, decisions